faq

Who are you guys? / What is Foul Papers?
We are Shannan Palma and Lorien Dana. We both write speculative fiction. Lorien is a middle school science teacher and married mother of two. Shannan is working on her dissertation, analyzing myth and popular culture from a feminist standpoint. She’s the one who blogs. Together we are Foul Papers, a speculative fiction workshop that we founded in 1997.

What’s this blog about?
It started off about speculative fiction writing (science fiction, fantasy, and everything in between and just outside), but then I (Shannan) started working from home and reading bunches and bunches of blogs, and posting more often, and well, it got random pretty fast. It’s eclectic! That’s part of the charm.

Is there a schedule for the features?
There used to be. There hasn’t been for a while now.

What’s up with Ghost Stories? When will it be finished?
Ghost Stories is an original fiction written for this website. Begun in April of 2007, we continued installments for as long as we were able before our insanely busy lives made the collaboration temporarily too difficult. It came down to writing Ghost Stories or getting paid, and we both have too many dependents to chose otherwise! We have plans to continue the story in one of three ways. We’d love to resume the installments when our lives ease up, but if that doesn’t work out, then either Lorien will write a condensed short story version of Wilhelmina’s tale, and Shannan will write a condensed short story version of Delia’s, and we will post both of those; or just one of us will wrap the whole thing in one short story. For the time being we’ve taken down the finished installments so that we don’t accidentally hook any new readers. If anything changes, Shannan will post a notice on the blog.

Why “Foul Papers?”
Foul Papers are what the Elizabethans called their rough drafts. We have a lot of those.

Do you have a regular website?
Shannan is getting a site ready to launch for her new coaching business, and Lorien is prepping one for her new murder-mystery tea party business. Don’t worry, we’ll let you know when they go up!

Can I post comments?
Sure, but they are moderated, so please don’t flame us or just post a trackback to your blog / webpage / whatever. Respond to the post or answer a question we’ve posed.

Will you promote my blog / webpage / book?
Maybe. Send us an email through the Contact Us page and we’ll see.

What are your current projects?
We’re both in the middle of book projects at the moment. And that’s all we’ll say about that. If you want to know more, check back on the blog or our individual pages (linked above).